As a member of AHA’s Long-Term Care & Rehabilitation Council, Lori Jarboe, CEO of Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital of Lakeview, is
working to help AHA hear Kentucky post-acute care (PAC) voices to represent and help guide
national post-acute care initiatives. AHA is continuing to work on
advancing a post-acute care media campaign to build awareness of the value
of post-acute care. As part of this plan, they will be using a variety of
channels to feature innovative PAC initiatives and partnerships. PAC hospitals in Kentucky are invited
to join this process by sharing one or more of the following with Jarboe:

A few sentences describing your PAC innovation/s. What
was the need driving your efforts? Who were your key partners? How did
your effort reduce costs and/or improve outcomes?
Recommend a referring hospital representative who
would be willing to speak on the value of post-acute care services. How
does the post-acute care organization provide unique value? What does...

Earlier today, KHA submitted comments to CMS regarding the proposed fiscal year 2020 inpatient rehabilitation facility (IRF) prospective payment system rule. The comments are available to members on the Policy page of the KHA website.

KHA specifically commented on the definition of a rehabilitation physician and the proposed weighted motor score.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Nancy Galvagni at KHA (ngalvagni@kyha.com).

Inpatient Rehabilitation Facility (IRF) and Long-term Care Hospital (LTCH)
providers are encouraged to review their performance data on each quality
measure based on First Quarter 2016 to Fourth Quarter 2016 data, prior to the
December 2017 IRF and LTCH Compare refresh, during which this data will be
publicly displayed.

Providers have 30 days to review their performance data (September 1,
2017 through September 30, 2017).

Corrections to the underlying data will not be permitted during this time.
However, providers can request a CMS review during the preview period if
they believe their data is inaccurate.

Inpatient Rehabilitation Facility (IRF) and Long-term Care Hospital (LTCH)
Quality Reporting Program (QRP) Provider Preview Reports are now available. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) encourages providers to review their performance data on each quality
measure based on Third Quarter 2015 to Second Quarter 2016 data prior to the
June 2017 LTCH Compare refresh, during which this data will be publicly
displayed. Providers have until the end of the 30-day preview period (March
30, 2017) to review their data. Corrections to the underlying data will not
be permitted during this time. However, providers can request a CMS review
during the preview period if they believe their data is inaccurate.

The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) held a second session on January 15 – on post-acute care and site-neutral payments between skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) and inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRFs).

What You Need to Know:
Commissioners voted unanimously for a recommendation that would make payment site-neutral between IRFs and SNFs for a set of conditions yet to be determined by the Secretary over a three year period.
MedPAC believes this recommendation would decrease Medicare payment by between $1 billion and $5 billion without negative impact on beneficiaries.
The Commissioners voted unanimously to support a recommendation that would eliminate the difference in payment between inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRFs) and skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) for selected conditions. Reductions in payment to IRFs would be phased in over three years. Note that the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) would decide which conditions would...

In addition to submitting comments regarding the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed rule for the long-term acute care hospital (LTACH) prospective payment system (PPS) (as mentioned yesterday in the KHA News Blog), KHA has submitted comments on how the proposed rule affects both inpatient and rehabilitation PPS.